Basic Subjects

Yoga Education

Vidya Bharati’s central office has sent a message to all its schools and affiliated organizations to actively observe the International Yoga Day is celebrated on 21st June. Excerpts from the circular:

Vidya Bharati’s central office has sent a message to all its schools and affiliated organizations to actively observe the International Yoga Day is celebrated on 21st June. Excerpts from the circular:

According to Indian life philosophy, the importance of yoga in the overall development of a child cannot be questioned. It is because of this reason that Vidya Bharati has included yoga teaching as one of its five basic education subjects. Today the whole world has accepted the importance of yoga and 21st June is now celebrated as International Yoga Day all around the globe.

Celebrating yoga in all our schools and associated organizations will not only make the teaching of yoga more effective but also create awareness among the society around us.

This drive towards yoga can be further accelerated if we involve our alumni, our old teachers, and our old yoga teachers too.

Some action points to achieve this can be:
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1) Make a complete plan of action to implement yoga teaching in the school.
2) Exhibiting our best performers on International Yoga Day.
3) In the summer holidays, a special 7-day event can be arranged for the training of interested students in yoga.
4) Similarly, special yoga camps can be organized for parents and even community members under the supervision of yoga teachers.
5) Every morning students are asked to practice Surya Namaskar.
6) Talks should be organized laying emphasis on how yoga can benefit the well-being of an individual.

Music Education

In the early 1980s, Shri Lajja Ram Ji Tomar, who was the life of Vidya Bharati, gave the responsibility of planning for the uniformity of the Vandana sung in schools and its recitation, to Vishwaratna, founder principal of Delhi's Geeta Bal Bharti Vidyalaya.

The principal assigned this task to Sri Rajkumar Verma, the music teacher of the school. Sri Verma, along with a few other schools’ music teachers prepared a 10-minute schedule of the Vandana. This included:

(1) संस्कृत वंदना -या कुंदेंदु ...(2) हिंदी प्रार्थना - हे हंस वाहिनी ...(3) ब्रह्मनाद ...(4) मौन (1 मिनट) ...(5) गायत्री मंत्र ...(6) भारत माता वंदना श्लोक ...(7) शांति पाठ ...
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An audiotape, titled ‘Archana’ was prepared, copies of which were sent to every school of Vidya Bharati.
Awakening of emotional unity with music and respect for provincial languages.
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In addition to Vandana, 10 songs of different provincial languages of the country were also included in this audio cassette. NCERT’s book 'आओ मिलकर गाएं' was made the basis of this.

It was urged that apart from the language of their province, a song of another provincial language (changed every year) should be taught to the children so that every student who passed class XII learned singing songs of eight-ten languages of their country easily and establish familiarity with those languages.

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Vandana improved-sophistication

Vandana continued to improve, based on the experience and suggestions gained after five to seven years. Technology also changed. Audio came on CD from the cassette. Now the CD has come on email. So far 6 editions of 'Archana' have been published.

Determination of songs at all India level

Every year, a Sanskrit song and a Hindi song were set for primary classes and one song for secondary classes at an all India level, and the sequence of sending its audio clip over email started.

Music as a basic subject

In the year 1989-90, the theory of physical education, music education, Sanskrit, Yoga, and moral and spiritual education disciplines emerged for the training of ‘Panchamahabhut’, corresponding Panchkosh and their spheres of human-body, mind, intellect, life, and soul.

For the balanced and holistic development of personality, it was planned to include these five subjects in Vidya Bharati schools in the school curriculum.The task of training the mind was to do music, so after intense thinking, work started on the music textbook and syllabus.

Nature of music education

1. Music listening opportunities:
Students are given the opportunity to listen to high-quality melodious music on the school's public broadcasting system as per the following schedule : (A) 20-25 minutes before the school Vandana, (b) short recess time and (c) 15 minutes after the full recess. It was decided that (A) Music of devotional music (b) Patriotic music and (c) movement music should be played.

2. Vandana Session:There should be a 40-minute Vandana session, with 10 minutes of Vandana, 10 minutes of musical material and 10 minutes of other activities. 10 minutes to gather at the Vandana site from the classroom and return to the classroom after the Vandana.

In this way, the plan of time for this Vandana should be planned and implemented.

3. The schedule for the 10 minutes given to the music, Vidya Bharati has published a book called 'Archan Vandan', which contains many lessons like morning remembrance, Ekatmata Stotra, couplets, chaupaiyans, Vande Mataram, etc.

4: Introduction to music and practice:A textbook called 'Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Padhi Ni' was produced and it was decided that every school should have a music teacher and each class should be given two periods a week for music. What to teach, how to teach and how to evaluate - the complete music curriculum was produced and published in March 1993.

5. The syllabus covered the practice of two ‘ragas’ in each class from standard 6 to 12. In this way, Vidya Bharati Uttar Kshetra has done the work of recording a CD and publishing a book on patriotic songs based on these 14 ragas.

Awareness and encouragement

It was decided that every year different types of music competitions should be held starting from the inter-class level to the inter-district level and award the winners.

Expected changes

#Awakening of patriotic as well as ‘sattvic’ sentiments in the atmosphere of schools. As a result, the direction of the life of the students is determined.

# Overall improvement in school discipline.

# Promotion of a positive attitude among all members of the school family.